


another twenty-four hours

by satellites (orphan_account)



Category: Young Justice (Cartoon)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-10
Updated: 2013-05-10
Packaged: 2017-12-10 23:35:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/791471
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/satellites
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Wally breaks his leg while trying to dance in the shower. Artemis thinks it's hilarious.</p>
            </blockquote>





	another twenty-four hours

**Author's Note:**

> brella: sorry this fic is taking so long i had to research how to break down a door  
> izzy: oh my god

“Babe!?”

Artemis glances up from the waffle iron at the sound, her arms instinctively stiffening. She can hear the water from the shower running, but the loud and obnoxious (and frankly off-key) performance of “Cell Block Tango” has abruptly ceased, to be replaced by the yelp she just heard.

“What?” she barks back, hoping Wally can hear her over the water.

“I…” His voice sounds strained and high. “I tried to parkour off the sides of the bathub and I think I broke my leg; can you call every ambulance available, please?” 

She immediately drops the plate of bacon in her hands.

“You  _what_?!” she hollers.

“Uh, I  _hurt_  myself!” he calls back in half of a sob. “Oh my god, does it matter? I’m dying. Oh god. And I’m wasting water.”

Artemis, having great experience with reacting appropriately whenever Wally does something like this, immediately covers her mouth and nose with one hand and starts to giggle.

She’s hoping her palm will muffle it, but it doesn’t. From the bathroom, she hears a whimper of, “Are you…  _laughing_?  _Are you laughing_?!”

“No!” she guffaws, making her way down the hallway to the bathroom doubled-over. Brucely, having heard the commotion from the couch, trots after her, his tail wagging with anticipation.

She gets to the closed door and grasps the knob in one hand, but when she goes to turn it, it doesn’t move. She freezes.

“Babe, the door’s locked,” she deadpans.

The noise Wally makes sounds more tragic than any dying thing, human or animal.

“Why is the door locked?” she demands immediately, aghast.

“Uh…” He’s groaning through gritted teeth, high-pitched and pitiful. “I was –  _tsss_   _ow_  – no reason! I wasn’t like… doing anything… in here.”

“Wally, you seriously think I don’t hear you doing ‘Smooth Criminal’ at six in the morning?” She bangs her palm against the door as though it will help. “You locked the bathroom door because you didn’t want me to walk in on you pretending to be Catherine Zeta-Jones; are you  _kidding_  me?” 

“Am I gonna die in here?” he yells.

“Not if you open the door,” she retorts. Brucely paws at the wood curiously, snuffling. “Hurry up; Brucely’s getting agitated.”

“I  _can’t_  open the door, stupid; I’m crippled!” She hears a thud and what can only be described as a shriek. “See, I just  _tried_ , and now I’m drowning!”

“Okay – stand back,” Artemis orders him, spreading her feet apart and steadying herself.

“I can’t stand at all, but thanks,” Wally replies flatly. “Wait,  _what_ —”

Before he can finish, Artemis swiftly raises her leg and slams her heel against the area near the lock, which makes a loud noise that immediately startles Brucely into galloping away in terror. She tries again, twice more, ignoring Wally’s shouts of indignation (“We  _just_  got this place;  _we just got this place_!”) before the wood finally splinters around the lock and the door swings open. 

The edge of it halts when it knocks into something on the wet floor.

“That’s my head,” Wally croaks. 

Artemis toes her shoes off and carefully enters the bathroom, the soles of her feet splashing down in the thin layer of water from the overflowing shower (and don’t even get her started on how showers overflow). Wally is lying in the middle of all of it, sodden hair and an unpleasantly askew left leg, flat on his back and wincing through his tears.

“Can you please stop ogling me and call 911?” he implores her. 

“I wasn’t,” she lies, before reaching over him to turn off the water.

She hunkers down and slips her arm to him, hooking her hand under his armpit and letting him use her as leverage to wobble to stand on one foot. He clumsily slings his arm over her shoulders and grimaces, smiling stiffly at her in gratitude as she reaches for a towel and ties it deftly around his waist one-handed. 

“Are you sure you don’t wanna just lie on the floor?” she asks him when she sees him bite his lip.

“Yyy _yep_ ,” he grinds out so tightly that it sounds like his throat is closing up. “Just get me to the couch, please.”

“No way am I calling you an ambulance, Wally.” Artemis rolls her eyes. “We’re  _driving_  you to the hospital.”

Wally lets out a choking noise.

“Are you  _joking_?” he barks. “I’m wearing a  _towel_ , Artemis! I’m not going to the hospital in a towel!”

“They’ll give you one of those gowns; you’ll be fine,” she says breezily. “And you’re doing fine hopping around on one foot, so it’s not like we need an ambulance to drive you anyway. Quit being such a baby.”

“I’m not a baby,” Wally pouts. Artemis ignores him, swipes the car keys from the coffee table, and leads Wally slowly to the door and down the stairs.

* * *

“Hi, my boyfriend tried parkouring in the shower and broke his leg; can he get that fixed?” she asks the emergency room receptionist when they get to the Stanford Hospital. Wally’s cheeks are flushed, completely eradicating his freckles, though whether it’s from embarrassment or pain Artemis isn’t sure. 

“The parkour or the leg?” the receptionist replies dryly. “Sign in, please.”

Artemis does so while Wally whimpers, practically hanging off of her, and the receptionist hands her a clipboard.

“You go have a seat and fill out your insurance information; the triage nurse’ll be here to check him out in a minute.”

“A  _minute_?” Wally chokes out. “You expect me to sit out here naked for a  _minute_?”

“Ignore him,” Artemis mutters, steering him to the chairs. Several of the children waiting in the play area giggle at him, and an older woman seated beside a man with a bloodied hand turns red when Wally’s legs spread in his chair.

They only have to wait for about fifteen minutes, but Wally complains for every single second of them, sending forlorn glances to his leg.

“Why is it taking so long?” he hisses.

“Because your leg’s not gonna get any  _more_  broken, but there are probably people who have actual problems that could kill them, so we have to wait,” she replies briskly. It feels far too similar to talking to a child. 

Wally folds his arms and sniffles and Artemis preoccupies herself with looking at a six-year-old, grape juice-stained issue of _Highlights_. 

* * *

Artemis thanks any and every deity that Oliver’s insurance covers the both of them, especially when Wally has to get an x-ray and a papoose and all other kinds of words that make her glad she didn’t decide to pursue the medical career her mother suggested; he chooses a cast color that’s obnoxiously loud and yellow, and for the car ride back, he draws red lightning bolts on it in Sharpie, whistling Michael Jackson like nothing has changed.

The hospital lets him keep the gown they give him, just because they don’t want to encourage any further indecency, but they at least return the towel, and it sits folded in Wally’s lap in a perfect square.

“Retiring from the Team was supposed to tone  _down_  the injuries,” she jibes him, turning onto their street.

“You know me,” he replies cheekily, grinning and passing her the Sharpie. “Quick, sign me. Gimme your number.”

“You  _know_  my number,” she exclaims. “And I’m driving!”

“Yeah, yeah, I know, but I always wanted a girl to write down her number on a cast of mine.” He grins.

“Oh, so that explains why you kept breaking everything in your body on every mission you got.” She shakes her head, leaning back and steering with one hand, dangling her other arm out the window.

“Please?” he asks, clasping his hands at his chin.

She sighs and parks the car in front of their building.

“Fine,” she says. “But I’m never taking a shower with you again.”

His face falls. 

“I’ve lost everything,” he whispers, blanching, as she turns the engine off and swipes the Sharpie to scribble down the number for the sex hotline.

“Not everything,” she replies with quirked lips, doodling an arrow before returning the pen to him. 

He perks up slightly and she finishes, “You still have Mr. Cellophane.”

He groans and sinks down in his seat. Artemis, as she so often does, chooses that moment – the lowest point of dignity – to lean over the gear shift, brace her hands at either side of his seat, and kiss him, clambering into his lap.

“He kinda loses his charm after a while,” he says breathlessly when she breaks away for a moment, and she smirks.

“So do you,” she retorts, and kisses him again. 

**Author's Note:**

> My buddy Izzy was having a bad day and we'd spent an embarrassingly long amount of time headcanoning the shit out of Wally West's music-related antics. Plus, she reblogged [this post](http://waldowest.tumblr.com/post/49402246274/londongrimshaw-falls-in-the-shower-parkour) and tagged it "wally west" and yeah, we're done.


End file.
